Cross-border love story in legal bind

The love story of a self styled ‘lance corporal' of the separatist United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa) and a Bangladeshi girl has caught up in a legal bind.

The ULFA militant, who is a resident of Goalpara in western Assam, has sought the intervention of the High Court to unite with his Bangladeshi lover.

The move has become a sort of headache for the Assam government which has been trying in vain since the last one year to deport the Bangladeshi girl to her homeland.

Last year in January, Babrubahan Rabha, an ULFA cadre brought the Bangladeshi girl Santana to Goalpara after falling in love with her during his stay in Bangladesh but the police soon came to know about their cross-border love affairs.

Rabha himself told the media that he met Santana in Bangladesh and they fell in love. He joined the ULFA in 2010 and had gone to Chittagong in Bangladesh for training.

Later, accompanied by an associate, he came back to Assam along with Santana but the police on a tip-off arrested the lover duo.

Currently lodged in a detention camp in Kokrajhar, the ULFA cadre apart from seeking legal help has also made an appeal to the Gauhati High Court seeking his lover’s release.

As per investigation reports, Santana who is a Bangladeshi national entered India illegally violating the Passport Rules, 1950 [case no.5/2013/US 6(A) IPP Rules, 1950] and was arrested and sent to a detention camp in Kokrajhar.

A case has been registered in this regard at Krishnai Police Station in Goalpara district.

An officer from the police investigation team, however, said that Santana who came with ULFA cadre Rabha had no links with the banned organization.

Last year on January 14, the Gauhati High Court, on the basis of the case filed with it, gave four weeks time to the Assam government to send Santana back to Bangladesh.

Santana is a resident of Bowasari village in Khagrachari district of Bangladesh which is often frequented by some northeast–based insurgent groups.

The Assam Police got in touch with Santana’s village and also managed to verify her identity with the help of a school teacher who knew Santana well.

However, the Bangladesh Police which was requested through New Delhi to initiate steps to take her back didn’t take any action. The Assam government also failed to elicit response from Dhaka even after taking up the matter with Bangladesh High Commission in New Delhi.

For Santana, it is not an easy life in the detention camp and more so because she eloped with a member of an organization which is “waging a war against India”.

Now she wants to go back to her country even as her paramour has initiated legal efforts to unite with her.

A Home department official claims the issue has become a “headache” for the government. It cannot keep her long in the detention camp and deportation is not happening because Dhaka is showing no interest in taking her back.